Shadows
by kookykey
Summary: He is standing in the shadow. She wonders how much that hurts. Uhura thinks about Jim Kirk
1. Chapter 1

They are holding a celebration. Trying desperately to find a sliver of happiness, despite all that's been lost.

Every impression she's ever got from Jim Kirk led her believe he'd be in there lapping up all the attention sent his way. He should be basking in his achievements, glowing from everything he had somehow accomplished. Instead he is standing out here in the dark and the cold looking more than a little bit broken.

She realizes he is standing in the shadow.

She recalls all the headlines she's read over the past week.

'George kirks son follows in his footsteps'

'James Kirk lives up to his father's legacy'

'James Kirk a hero like his father'

For a moment she wonders how it feels to live in the shadow of a man he will never meet. To be constantly compared to someone that he has never known.

She wonders how much it hurts.

She watches as he sighs deeply and buries his face in his hands and she feels her heart break a little, because it just isn't _fair._

His father may have saved 800 lives but he saved the whole damn planet and he deserves some recognition of that. He doesn't need to hear that his father would be proud of him, he needs to know that the rest of the world is. He needs living, breathing people to appreciate what he's done on his own merit. He needs them to appreciate who _he is_ not who his father _was._

He looks so much like George Kirk and she thinks maybe that's why people have so much trouble separating father and son, why when they look at Jim they can't help but see George as well.

She wonders how he feels about that.

She has never made her dislike of him a secret and in spite of everything that's changed, that hasn't. She still does not like him, but now she respects him, respects the fact she is alive because of his actions.

If someone had told her a year ago that she would one day feel sorry for Jim Kirk she would have laughed in their face, but standing here watching him shake with suppressed emotion, she does.

Because what he did was fantastic and amazing and extraordinary and far greater than anything his father ever accomplished but still the world can only see George kirks son.

She wants to scream at every person on this stupid planet to stop being so blind, so cruel, because Jim should be standing tall and proud, not sitting in the dark and the cold feeling more than a little bit broken. He shouldn't still be in the shadow.

He stands now with what she now knows is his mask firmly in place, ready to go back into that room and be the arrogant man she once believed he was, but now knows he isn't.

Now she has seen a glimpse of the anguish and pain that he carries around with him day after day.

She wonders how he copes.

She watches him walk away and can only hope that one day someone, somewhere will shine a light on captain James T Kirk, and that the world will see the brilliant man for who he is.

She hopes that one day he can step out of his shadow.


	2. Chapter 2

One week later and it is hard to believe she ever witnessed Jim Kirk have a moment of vulnerability. He has been flawless. All week he has been the perfect picture of a calm, composed professional.

She thinks all he really wants to do is cry, or scream. It's Probably both.

Now he is standing in front of her looking impossibly unsure of himself and asking her to help him contact his mother.

His mother, she forgot about her part in all of this.

"I've sent a couple of messages, but she hasn't responded. Maybe there's a problem with the channel?" she can hear the nervousness in his voice, but she doesn't understand what he's afraid of.

"I'll boost the signal, see what happens"

"Thanks"

She sets to work and it isn't long until Winona Kirk is staring out the screen.

"Hello, my name is lieutenant Uhura, I'm contacting you on behalf of your son Capt.."

"I can't" she cuts in fiercely.

She blinks back the shock at the harsh words and feels unease grow in her stomach.

"I can't talk to him, hell I can't look him okay. Tell him I'm...look just tell him anything you want. I just can't"

With that Winona ends the transmission, it's clear she didn't know her son was standing in the corner or maybe she did, but just didn't care. All she can do is stare at the blank screen and wonder what the hell just happened. She turns to talk to Jim, tries to think of what she could possibly say to comfort him, but she comes up empty. Nothing can erase the hurt he must feel from that heart breaking rejection. Turns out it doesn't matter that she has been shocked speechless, he's gone.

She understands now where the fear came from, he was evidently expecting that to happen. No one should ever expect something like that.

She was _his mother_, she should be glowing with pride, and bursting with the need to tell her son how proud of him she is. Instead she turned him away. Obviously too haunted by the ghost of her long dead husband that she must see in Jims face. Obviously too scared of the pain it would bring her.

She shouldn't _care._ She should put it aside for her son. That's what mothers are supposed to do. Apparently no one told Winona Kirk that.

She's crying for him now, crying the tears she knows he will never allow himself to shed.

It strikes her that only a week ago she caught a glimpse of the pain it caused him when the media couldn't see him through his Father's shadow. She can't even comprehend the agony that must sear his soul at the thought that his own mother can't see him either.

...

She studies him closely the next day, trying to find an outward sign of the pain he must be feeling, there is none. The mask he so desperately hides behinds is firmly in place, as impenetrable as ever. Not even a crack.

She imagines that it must have taken a lot of practice to be that good at hiding his pain, or maybe that reaction is so familiar to him that he has long since accepted it.

Both the answers make her feel incredibly sad, both explanations break her heart.

...

She hates knowing these things about Jim Kirk, mostly because she can feel guilt creeping in as she recalls all the times over the last 3years that she called him spoilt and privileged, when it is now blatantly obvious that he has never been any of those things.

She finds him in the same spot he sat last time, this must be where he comes to think. It wasn't so long ago that she would have laughed at the idea of him thinking, now she knows better. So she isn't going to stand in the shadows this time, and she isn't going to let him either.

"Hello Captain"

He looks at her and offers a tired smile. A smile that didn't have the slightest hint of happiness in it, and she feels her newly mended heart begin to crack again.

"I know why your here, but it doesn't matter okay"

How can he say that? Of course this matters. He wouldn't be sat alone swallowed up in sadness if this _didn't matter._

"Did you know she'd do that?" she sees him flinch and close his eyes briefly, contemplating what to say, how much to reveal.

"I guess, we don't really talk much, never have ya know, I just thought that maybe after everything..." he trails off apparently unable to give voice to the hope that has just been crushed. She finishes for him.

"You thought that saving earth might change things"

He snorts and shakes his head.

"She hasn't been able to look me in the eye since I was 10 years old, never mind _helping_ to save the planet, don't think there's anything with the power to change that"

She can hear the bitterness hanging off every syllable. She can see the lost look in his eyes and fights the urge to wrap an arm around him.

"That must have been hard on you" she watches in fascination as the shutters close down on his eyes, his postures stiffens and she just knows he is not going to say another word about the situation. He is done sharing.

"Look, Jim"

"Leave it alone Uhura, I told you. It doesn't matter" it is said with such finality that anything she might have said in response dies on her lips. He walks away, head held high and she knows it's an act. She knows how much he hides. How much hurt he carries. How much it must kill him to be unloved by his mother.

God it's so tragic.

He is an incredible man and she has no doubt that he will do incredible things and she is going make sure that the world and especially Winona Kirk, she refuses to call that women his mother, will see how brilliant he is one day.

Then they will regret that they ever placed him in another mans shadow.


End file.
